While it was once believed that Marxism would overhaul notions of ownership, the combination of capitalism and the Internet has transformed our ideas of property to an extent far beyond the dreams of even the most fervent revolutionary. Which is not to say that anything resembling a collectivist utopia has come to pass. Quite the opposite. In fact, the laws regulating property?and intellectual property, in particular?have never before been so…

Any syllabus is fated to yield to the messy circumstances of its course, with results that cannot be predicted. This is reason enough to be against syllabi; their presentation of a course as a fully reasoned, systematically organized thing is spurious. A course that is only its syllabus, day after day, is a course where spontaneity, improvisation, and risk have been banished. The loss is too great. —Terry Caesar —Against…

Web publishers and bloggers are already stealing readers, advertisers and classifieds. Particularly for young people, journalism has become, in the words of NYU professor and PressThink.org blogger Jay Rosen, more of a conversation than a lecture. That conversation, at least for now, almost always begins with a traditional news story, which is then subject to annotation and dissection on blogs, which are now read by 27 percent of the U.S.…

1.) J-School as School of Theology 2.) The Journalist’s Creed 3.) The Orthodoxy of No Orthodoxy 4.) Practicing Journalism But Not Understanding It 5.) The First Amendment as Press Religion 6.) The God Term of Journalism is the Public 7.) A Breakaway Church in the Press 8.) Interview at the Axis of Evil —Jay Rosen —Journalism Is Itself a Religion: Special Essay on Launch of The Revealer (Press Think) Another link…

“The ideal of objectivity, properly understood, is vital not only for responsible journalism but responsible scientific inquiry, informed public policy deliberations and fair ethical and legal decision. The peculiar Western attempt to be objective is a long, honorable tradition that is part of our continuing struggle to discern and communicate significant, well-grounded truths and make fair decisions in society,” [UBC journalism professor Stephen J. Ward] writes in his book [Invention…

A computer that learns to play a ‘scissors, paper, stone’ by observing and mimicking human players could lead to machines that automatically learn how to spot an intruder or perform vital maintenance work, say UK researchers. CogVis, developed by scientists at the University of Leeds in Yorkshire, UK, teaches itself how to play the children’s game by searching for patterns in video and audio of human players and then building…